A Little Better Each Time

I had a dentist appointment yesterday, a routine 3-month checkup and cleaning, which I’ve finally fallen into the habit of after not being very good at oral health my entire life. I was not a regular brusher as a kid, and flossing was rare unless someone was hovering over me, so dentist visits absolutely sucked.

Not only because I was constantly getting scolded, but also I would have to get a lot of work done. And back in the day the concept of “compassionate patient care” was not a thing.

So I hated going, and it didn’t instill the lesson of, “If you brush and floss more, these visits won’t be so bad.” No… that lesson took years to sink in. I’m lucky to have decent dental insurance and I’ve found an office that I like, and I’ve gotten both routine and emergency things handled, so it’s all good.

However, the checkups still weren’t great. I brush, I water floss, I string floss, but that latter isn’t as frequent as I’d like, which leads to me being told, “Try and do better.”

That’s it? “Try and do better?” I’m not being yelled at, I’m not getting a disappointed look, just acknowledgement of my efforts and advice on improving? What’s the scam here, doc? Younger me could have never predicted this kind of treatment.

I’ll never be perfect at managing my teeth, but each time I visit for a cleaning, it takes less time, and I will take that as a win.

Recently on Bluesky I talked about sharing the things we’re watching, reading, playing, etc. that bring us a moment of joy. Especially in this hellscape that’s gotten even more hellish. And while this might be completely mortifying, it is related to my dentist visits.

My dentist office isn’t close by, it’s about a 30-40 minute metro ride, but they were recommended by a friend and I like the break in routine to visit. I also enjoy grabbing short fiction to read on the way, and in the waiting room–because there’s always a wait.

And more often than not, that short fiction happens to be “queer paranormal romance” the latter two words occasionally being a stand in for “smut”. The joy of an e-reader is no one know has to know what you’re reading. Unless you blog about it… whoops. 😅

I recently discovered Bro and the Beast of The Wolf’s Mate series from one of my “free and cheap e-books” email lists, and it sounded intriguing.

It’s an M/M omegaverse story containing all the usual tropes that come with the genre, but it’s also got an isekai element as the main character becomes transported into a book, where he then becomes the main character.

It’s similar to “villainess” anime where a main character wakes up as the antagonist of a video game, but their presence and decisions start changing the game. The main character is a straight jock frat bro who, after a car crash, ends up in his gay twin brother’s shifter romance novel as the protagonist.

Like many of these stories, each chapter is told from the perspective of one of the two love interests. So you get Brad protesting at this new reality and trying to wake up from a “dream,” and you get Raul not understanding why his captivating new mate is so reluctant to accept him.

Oh, and there’s definitely sex–it’s usually a big part of this genre, pun intended. But as I said during the PAX Unplugged panel, don’t worry about what’s on my Kindle reading list, mind your business.

I know I don’t currently have the attention span for a long read at the moment, so I take what joy I can find in the short reads, and they’re perfect for sitting on the metro and in the waiting room, or something to read while winding down for the night. It’s been a rough January, I’ll take what I can get.

Today might be a day to head outside for a walk, the temps are barely reaching towards the 50s so I might layer up and tackle the park. 💖